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Why Data
Centers Provide Improved File Security
The
online working model of today includes the hosting
of name-brand applications and the storage of files
at an off-site data center, rather than on your local
PC. Why is this an advantage?
An application service provider (ASP), such as e-Accounting,
hosts their customers’ software and data on a
sophisticated series of high speed commercial servers
located in a safe, secure environment—a protected
data facility. These machines are far more powerful
than what you or any traditional users have. They
are maintained by engineers who ensure they are up
to date and secure.
All files residing at the center are protected with
regularly updated anti-virus scanning and are automatically
backed up nightly. Users need not worry about these
details because of this valuable IT service.
In addition, hosting applications and files at a data
center eliminates the need to upgrade local computers
and software. A customer can use old computers and
leverage existing assets. The local computer need
only connect to the data center over the Internet.
When software upgrades are necessary, the customer
relies on the ASP to test new versions and host them
on the platform.
This takes customers almost entirely out of the business
of upgrading workstations, new versions of software
for each staff member, protecting data from viruses,
and running daily saves on backup tapes or CDs. All
these tasks are performed by technical experts—the
ASP staff—the optimal secure and affordable option.
How
it can work
for you
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Evaluating Tax Season
Time
to assess how to improve processes in the coming year
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Congratulations! You made it through another tax
season. With stress relieved and the realities of tax-related
tasks fresh in your mind, it may be a good time to evaluate
how your practice can improve processes for next year's season
and for ongoing client services. You can start by asking yourself
whether or not you encountered these scenarios in the last
several months. Did you:
- Spend
an inordinate amount of time worrying over or trying to
fix technical problems?
- Get blindsided
by a computer crash and loss of data?
- Waste too
much time traveling to clients’ offices?
- Work late
at the office too many times when you’d rather be
at home?
- Increasingly
get barraged with client questions and requests as the
dreaded day of reckoning approached?
- Neglect
ongoing bookkeeping services because of tax season work?
Some
of these situations are inevitable. However, you may be
surprised how many of these problems can be greatly minimized
or altogether solved by switching to the online working
model or upgrading one of its components.
For example, by hosting QuickBooks, ProSeries, and/or MS
Office at a data center, rather than maintaining them at
your office, a firm can affordably outsource IT management,
virus protection, data recovery, and software upgrading.
Also, hosting applications and files enables you, your staff,
and your clients to work at home at anytime, work on the
same files together from any location, and allows your company
to more efficiently handle the onslaught of requests and
inquiries during tax season and perform ongoing bookkeeping
throughout the year.
Learn
more about trying or upgrading the online model
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The
Big Plus of
Managed IT Services |
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The
overlooked benefit
of the online working model
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The advantages of application hosting include
cross-platform world-wide access to data and software for
accountant and client. But an often under-realized benefit
of the online working model is its built-in managed IT services.
Firms that benefit the most from this service are the ones
least able to support their own in-house IT operations—in
other words, small-to-medium practices.
Accounting professionals understand the concept of outsourcing
non-core functions. Afterall, they are oursourcers, performing
the accounting functions for their business clients. Then,
why not outsource the IT functions necessary for an accountants’
core business?
This entails outsourcing the maintenance and protection of
clients’ financial data and the necessary software and
information network. This is what e-Accounting’s managed
IT services does. Consider these specific services that can
be outsourced:
- Creation and maintenance of an
information and communication network
- Setting up clients on the network
no matter where their location
- Testing and installing version
upgrades for hosted software
- Ongoing virus protection
- Automatic nightly backup of data
- Adoption of a remote-control feature
to enable easy training of clients in software use or
bookkeeping
Learn
more about outsourcing your IT tasks |
